Electrical connectors of the general type disclosed and claimed in this application are well known from the prior art. In order to facilitate storage, transport, and assembly of these electrical connector, they are commonly produced such that a connection tab is adapted to connect the electrical connector with a carrier-strip. These features allow a reeling of the electrical connectors connected to the carrier-strip onto a reel, which subsequently allows easy transportation or storage of a large quantity of electrical connectors. A reel with furled electrical connectors facilitates feeding the individual electrical connectors into a production process, so that the orientation of the electrical connectors is the same for all individual electrical connectors and no precautions for proper orientation of the electrical connectors is necessary.
During the production process, the individual electrical connectors to be processed need to be removed from the carrier-strip. This is performed by cutting the connection tab with a shear. Commonly, for instance, in the case of crimped contacts, removal of the electrical connectors is performed simultaneously with at least one further production step. Cutting the connection tab and, thereby removing the electrical connector from the carrier-strip is performed using a floating shear. The shearing force exerted to the connection tab by a shear portion of the floating shear depends on the material strength (e.g., thickness) of the connection tab.
When considering material thickness and the resulting shear force necessary for cutting the connection tab, the thickness of the shear portion has to be adapted to and depends on the material thickness. An increased thickness of the shear portion, however, reduces the available space for elements to be connected to the electrical connector, which may be, for instance, a cable with insulation and exposed lead wires. Crimping the lead wires and the insulation is preferably performed simultaneously with cutting the connection tab. The reduced space for the cable may negatively affect the crimping as the cable may not be positioned properly due to the thicker shear portion. Cutting and simultaneously processing an electrical connector, therefore, becomes more difficult with increasing sheet metal thickness, which, in turn, also reduces the lifetime of the floating shear as it is exposed to higher loads.